The distorted knuckle on the second finger was the souvenir of a less serious mishap. He had picked it up in practice where the errors didn't go into the record books. Funny thing about his fielding, McKee thought. Never could learn it. He could hit anybody who ever pitched to him. Bunt and hit to either field, and he had had the power for a kid his age, but finally the coach had used him as a pinch hitter. "Damnit, Berg," the coach had said, "if I leave you out there, you're going to get hit on the head and killed." That had ended his ambitions to be a baseball player, but it still seemed odd to him that the simple skill of timing a grounder and sensing the trajectory of a fly ball had been beyond him. McKee carefully replaced the injured hand in his shirt front. It was throbbing now, but the pain was tolerable. He stood up, surprised at how quickly his leg muscles had stiffened. A mockingbird flew out of a young cotton-wood tree, whistling raucously. It was then McKee was suddenly struck with the dismaying thought of Miss Ellen Leon.
Almost certainly in a very few hours he would meet her and, when he did, he would have to make her believe an absolutely incredible story. He walked slowly down the canyon, thinking of how he would tell it. As he thought, the incident seemed first wildly ridiculous and then entirely unreal. The canyon was filled with the cool, gray light of full dawn now. All that had happened under the moonlight was utterly absurd, like something out of a bad melodrama, and his own role in it had been thoroughly unheroic. Yet Miss Leon had to be told-to get her out of the canyon. There simply was no way to explain it all without sounding like a complete fool. McKee wished fervently that the visitor were a man.
He trudged steadily down the canyon, turning in his mind the problem of confronting the woman. He had skipped shaving yesterday in his haste to get to Chinle and call Leaphorn. Now the face which confronted him each morning in his bathroom mirror would be worse by two days' growth of bristles. And the torn and dirty shirt and the scraped cheekbone certainly wouldn't inspire confidence in a female. Neither, he thought glumly, would the improbable tale he had to tell.
When he heard the sound of the motor again, it came almost as a relief. He was crossing the point where a large tributary canyon drained into Many Ruins and where centuries of turbulent runoff had carved the cliffs into a series of horseshoe bends. The motor sound and its confusion of echoes seemed first to come from upstream, and then from downstream. Before it died abruptly away he decided the vehicle might be somewhere up the tributary. Talking Rock Canyon, he thought it was, but he wasn't sure. In the morning sunlight the sound of the truck seemed natural and sane, reassuring him that all that had happened in the darkness had not been merely nightmare.
And now he was sitting beside Miss Leon and she was saying that she wanted very badly to see Dr. Canfield this morning.
McKee converted his embarrassment to irritation.
"Listen," he said. "There's a man somewhere up this canyon who isn't acting rationally. I think he may have done something to Dr. Canfield. I don't know where the hell Canfield is and I can't start looking for him until I get you out of here."
Miss Leon said, "Oh," in a small voice and looked at McKee. He noticed again that she was a very pretty woman.
She thinks I'm a nut, he thought.
"Canfield was gone when I got back to the camp yesterday," McKee went on. "Left me a note and signed it 'John.' His name's Jeremy." Even as he said it, the explanation sounded ridiculous. Miss Leon glanced at him.
"What did the note say?"
"It said a Navajo had come by with a snakebite and he was taking him to Teec Nos Pas." The text of the note now seemed completely reasonable. "But why would he sign it with a phony name?"
"Maybe it was a joke," Miss Leon said.
Maybe it was a joke, McKee thought. If it is, I'll kill the smirking bastard.
"I thought of that, too," McKee said, "But last night, sometime after midnight, I saw a man sneaking up on our tent. Had a wolf skin over his head." He had planned not to mention the wolf skin, thinking it might frighten her, or merely make the entire episode seem more ludicrous. But he blurted it out.
"Is that how you got that awful bruise? Did he hit you?"
The sympathy in her voice made McKee feel about seven years old.
"No. No," he said, impatiently. "I fell on a rock."
Miss Leon slowed the Volks and shifted into low gear to make her way across a bed of rocks.
"Your hand's hurt, too," Miss Leon said.
"I'd like you to drive back to Shoemaker's," McKee said. "When you get there, tell Shoemaker that something happened to Canfield and ask him to call Chinle and get the Law and Order boys to send someone in here to help look."
McKee made a wry face.
"Or, if you meet Canfield on your way to Shoemaker's, just forget the whole thing." He laughed. Tell Canfield you met some kind of nut up the canyon named Bergen McKee."
"All right," Miss Leon said. She glanced at the right hand held rigidly inside his shirt front. "How badly…"
Immediately ahead of them around an abrupt bend of the canyon, there was the whining sound of a motor running at a high speed.
"Stop a minute," McKee said, but Miss Leon was already braking the car.
As he reached across with his left hand for the door handle, he brushed the injured finger and felt suddenly sick and weak as a fresh wave of pain engulfed his brain. He swung his legs out of the Volks and sat for a moment, head down, while the dizziness passed. He heard Miss Leon opening her door.
"I'll go see what's going on," he said. "You wait here." He realized, with self-disgust, that the words came slowly and his voice was thick. When he got to his feet she was already out of the car. Let it go, he thought. He didn't feel like arguing.
It was less than fifty yards to the canyon bend but McKee had identified the sound before they reached it. He was almost certain it was a winch working. His first glance around the rocky point confirmed this guess. Some five hundred yards downstream the canyon bent sharply to the north through a narrow defile. Here a section of the undercut cliff had collapsed, tumbling huge blocks of rimrock to the canyon floor. Just beyond this pile of talus, McKee saw a gray Land-Rover parked. A cable from the winch reel on its front bumper was attached to a ponderosa pine carried into the canyon by the landslide. The massive trunk of the long-dead tree was being swung slowly across the canyon.
"Looks like we walk out," McKee said softly.
"What in the world is he doing?"
"He's blocking us in with that tree."
"He is, isn't he?" She said it in a very small voice.
McKee couldn't see the man in the Land-Rover very well. He was wearing a black hat and there was something which might be a rifle barrel jutting at an angle out of the side window. The high whining noise of the winching operation had apparently covered the sound of their approach.
"Let's go," McKee said. "We'll drive back up the canyon and find one of those run-in washes, and climb out of here."
The sound of the winch stopped just as they reached the car. There was a long moment of silence as they climbed into the Volkswagen, and then the sound began again. McKee motioned for Miss Leon to start the motor.
"Quietly as you can," he said. "Don't race the motor and get it into second quick as possible."
She said nothing, driving competently and, McKee noticed out of the side of his eye, occasionally biting her lower lip.
"But why would that man want to block the road?" she asked suddenly. "Do you think we should just drive down there and ask him to let us through?"
"I don't think so," McKee said. He felt very, very tired.
"Was that the man you saw last night? The man with the wolf skin?"
"I don't know. I guess it is."
A half mile up the canyon he had her turn off the ignition. From far behind them there still came the high whine of the winch, a faint sound now.
"Anyway, he can't follow us," Miss Leon said. She smiled at McKee. "He's on the wrong side of his roadblock."
"That's right
," McKee said. But he knew it wasn't right. He had to work the winch from the down side because the tree top was pointing upstream. He'll simply swing the trunk downstream far enough so he can drive past it and then re-attach his winch line from the upstream side and pull it back in place across the canyon. He'll drive in and close the gate behind him. McKee wondered if Land-Rovers had four-wheel drive. He was almost certain they did. The Land-Rover could go anyplace the Volks could go, and lots of places it couldn't. The sense of urgency returned, and his hand and cheekbone began throbbing in harmony.
"Is your hand broken?"
"No," McKee said. "Sprained my little finger."
She looked at him. The sympathy in her eyes embarrassed him and he looked away. "But it hurts a lot," she said. "It would feel better if you let me bandage it."
"I think we better keep going," McKee said. "We'll drive up to our camp and get some water and stuff and find us a place we can climb out of here."
"Maybe Dr. Canfield will be back now," she said. "That is, if he didn't go out to Shoemaker's."
"Maybe so."
She still thinks I'm imagining a lot of this, McKee thought. That was good, in a way. No reason to frighten her more than he already had as long as she would cooperate. And yet it would be easier, somehow, if she shared his knowledge of danger.
Canfield was not at the camp. Nor was there any sign he had been there since McKee had left it. McKee hurriedly filled his canteen. He couldn't find Canfield's. It was probably in the camper truck. His papers were still on the folding table in the tent. If the man had examined them he had taken some care not to disarrange them. He pushed two cans of meat into his pocket, pushed the canteen into the front of his shirt, and picked up a box of crackers. What else would they need? He thought of the can opener on his pocket knife, found it beside his typewriter, and dropped it into his shirt pocket. His pickup, it occurred to him suddenly, would be better than the Volks. They could run it much farther up a side canyon-maybe even get it to the top. He trotted to the truck, switched on the ignition and kicked the starter. Nothing happened. He kicked the starter again and then he remembered seeing the man raising the hood. He raised the hood himself and looked down at the motor. The spark-plug wires were missing. He may be crazy, McKee thought as he trotted back to the Volks, but he's sure efficient.
"O.K.," he told Miss Leon, "we'll drive up the canyon about a mile. There's a place up there we can turn up a side canyon. We'll drive up it as far as this Volks will go and then we'll climb out."
Miss Leon was driving very slowly. McKee looked at her impatiently.
"Better speed it up."
Miss Leon was biting her lip again.
"Dr. McKee. Really. Don't you think we should wait there at camp?" She looked at him, her face determined. "I'm sure Dr. Canfield will be coming back soon, and if he doesn't… that man we saw down the canyon, I'm sure that man would help us."
Oh, God, McKee thought. Now I've got trouble with her.
"You can't possibly climb out of this canyon and walk all the way back to Shoemaker's with your head hurt like that. We're going back."
"Do you know why that pickup of mine wouldn't start?"
Miss Leon looked at him again.
"Why not?"
"Our friend had pulled the wires off the spark plugs."
She doesn't believe it, McKee thought. He felt suddenly dizzy with fatigue and pain.
"Look," he said. "If we had time, I'd take you back there and show you. But we don't have time." His voice was fierce. "Now drive and keep driving until I tell you to turn right."
Miss Leon drove, looking straight ahead. McKee looked at her profile. Her face was angry, but there was no sign of fear. It would be better if she was a little afraid, he thought, and he tried to think of what he might say. The pain in his hand had become suddenly like a knife through his knuckles, making concentration impossible. He inched it carefully out of his shirt front. The finger was rigid now, turning a bluish color, and the swelling had spread up the palm to the heel of his hand. He heard her sudden, sharp intake of breath.
"You need a doctor," Miss Leon said. "That hand's broken."
McKee put the hand carefully back inside his shirt, irritated at himself for giving her a chance to see it.
"It's just a dislocated knuckle. The swelling makes it look worse than it is."
"This is absolutely insane. I'm going to turn around and we're going back where you're camped and soak that hand." She started slowing the Volks.
McKee put his boot on top of her foot on the accelerator and pressed. The little car jerked forward and she pulled at the wheel to control it.
"Now get this straight," McKee said. His voice was angry and he spaced the words for emphasis. "I had a hard day yesterday. I was up all night. I'm tired and my hand hurts. I'm worried about Jeremy. You're going to behave and do what you're told. And I'm telling you again that we're going to climb out of this canyon."
"All right, then," Miss Leon said. "Have it your way."
There was a long, strained silence.
"If I'm wrong about that guy, I'll apologize," McKee said. "But really I can't take a chance on being wrong. Not if he's as crazy as I think he is."
Miss Leon was silent. He glanced at her. She looked away. McKee suddenly realized she was crying and the thought dismayed him. He slumped down in the seat, baffled.
"Is this where we turn?"
"Right, up that side canyon."
The tributary seemed narrower now than it had when he and Canfield had poked into it earlier. Just day before yesterday. It seemed like a week.
McKee wondered what he could say. What did you say when you made a woman cry? "Getting pretty narrow," he said.
"Yes."
The canyon bent abruptly and the stream bed here was too narrow for all four wheels. The Volks tilted sharply as the right wheels rolled over a slab of exposed sandstone. It jolted down, slamming the rear bumper against the stone.
McKee suddenly noticed tire tracks on the bank ahead of them. A truck had been in here recently, but before yesterday's rain. Runoff had wiped out the tracks on the sandy bottom but the rain had only softened the imprint where the stream hadn't reached.
McKee was suddenly alert and nervous.
Miss Leon slowed the Volkswagen.
"Do you want me to try to drive over that?" she asked. Just ahead the canyon walls pinched together and water-worn rocks upthrust through the sand.
"Ill take a look," McKee said. He climbed stiffly from the Volks. The rocks were partly obscured by brush and didn't look too formidable. A few yards upstream they gave way to another stretch of sand. Beyond, the canyon rose sharply and was crowded with boulders from a rock slide. It was probably impassable for a vehicle.
"Put it in low and angle to the left," McKee directed. "We can get it past that brush and leave it there out of sight."
The Volks jolted over the rocks more easily than McKee had expected. He showed Miss Leon where to park it out of the water course behind the brush and then collected the canteen and cracker box.
"We can lock the car," he said. "You can take anything you think you'll need, but I'd keep it light."
"I have a box of things I was taking to Dr. Hall," Miss Leon said. "I couldn't replace those."
"We can take it," McKee said. It was then he noticed she was wearing an engagement ring-a ring with an impressive diamond. Why be surprised? he thought. Why be disappointed? Of course she was engaged. Not that it could possibly matter.
Walking was easy for the first fifty yards across the hard-packed sand, but then it became a matter of climbing carefully over the rocks. McKee noticed with surprise that the truck had apparently made it across this barrier. Its path was marked by broken brush. He glanced back. Miss Leon was sitting on a rock, holding her ankle. He noticed she hadn't brought the box.
"What happened?"
"I twisted it." She looked frightened.
He looked at her wordlessly, feeling for the first time in his lif
e absolutely helpless. He walked back down the rocks toward her.
"How bad is it?" He squatted beside her, looking at the ankle. It was a very trim ankle, with no sign yet of swelling.
"I don't know. It hurts."
"Can you put your weight on it?"
"I don't think so."
McKee sat down and rubbed the back of his hand across his forehead. His head ached.
"We'll wait awhile," he said finally. "When it feels better, well go on."
He tried to think. If her ankle was sprained, it would swell soon. And if it was sprained it would be almost impossible for her to make the climb out. The long walk across rough country to Shoemaker's would be even more impossible. At least twenty-five miles, he calculated. Perhaps farther from here. What if they simply waited here? Would the man in the Land-Rover follow them?
And what if he did? McKee tried to retrace all that had happened since yesterday. The rams with their throats slashed. The note from Canfield. The man who came in the darkness. What had that been in his hand there in the moonlight? Had it really been a pistol? The feeling of being hunted down the canyon. That seemed unreal now. Incredible. But the tree being winched across the canyon had been real. He tried to think of an explanation for it. There was none. It must have been intended to close the canyon behind Miss Leon's Volkswagen. To pen them in. He rubbed his forehead again, and pulled out his cigarettes. Miss Leon was sitting motionless just below him, resting her head on her hand.
She's not very big, he thought. Maybe 110 pounds. If it wasn't for this damned hand he could carry her. Miss Leon's short-cut hair had fallen around her face. Her neck was very slender and very smooth. He felt a sharp, poignant sadness.
"Would you like a cigarette?"
"No thank you," Miss Leon said. She didn't look up.
"I can't tell you how sorry I am," McKee said slowly. "I know you must think I'm out of my mind. But that man…" He stopped. There was nothing to be gained by going over it again.
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